Something New, Something Old

Part of my journey in 2014 is trying out new and old games, their mechanical route and figuring out what I like and don’t. I’ve picked up more TableTop pencil and paper RPG books than I care to comment on. Among them stories and histories that I can’t always remember. I’ve started my run through Mutants & Masterminds, a journey that started some years ago as D&D 3.5 was offering it’s infrastructure to anyone who wanted it. This lead to various games with basic rules that were all the same and only the details changed. Crossbow here is a Lazer Kanon there. It was what we might call a second Dark Age after TSR got devoured by Wizards of the Coast (who was then eaten by Hasbro). History aside, it wasn’t bad but it wasn’t good. Currently at it’s 3rd Edition it’s replaced some of that infrastructure for a simpler approach to Superhero gaming.

All you need is a single d20 and time. For RPG veterans, it falls solidly between Storyteller system and Pathfinder for complexity with combat being the only troubling point.

Character construction is very open and allows for a variety of powers in styles I’ve played in other games. Notably I rebuilt a City of Heroes character with the assistance of a sidebook they made “Power Profiles” which was easily the second best purchase I’ve ever made following a main book. There they make themed suggestions on powers and build them using the rules in the main book. No, there’s nothing new, no new powers or options. Everything you ‘need’ is in the main book from civil weapons and vehicles to animals and thugs. I took the time to build myself a resource document to see where Normal People sit compared to Supers.

It’s well done and and easily amusing. You enjoy superhero table games, give me a chat we could meet online and play a dash or if you’re in the PDX we could have coffee over smashing a car and stealing minds.